LYNN — This is one show that should have been flipped.
Dennis DeYoung was the opening act Friday night at Lynn City Hall, with Eddie Money following him. It should have been the other way around.
It’s not that Money — who is 68 and looks every day of it — was awful. He was all right. A little ragged, perhaps, but he put on a decent show.
It’s just that the 70-year-old DeYoung, the voice behind Styx, was phenomenal.
To people of a certain age, Styx would have to qualify as a guilty pleasure. Their brand of grandiose, highly- (some might say over-) produced rock never sat well with those who would prefer their music a little more stripped down and a lot rawer. Like, say, Eddie Money.
And DeYoung certainly didn’t shy away from the glitz and glitter. Looking dapper in a black suit with a red shirt and matching red shoes, DeYoung was in fine voice and fine humor.
“How many are seeing me for the first time?” he asked. “When a fair amount of patrons clapped, he responded “well where the heck have you been. I’m 70, for crying out loud.”
He opened with “Grand Illusion,” which always sounded like it could have been an outtake from Emerson, Lake and Palmer’s “Karn Evil 9” sessions. From there, he segued into a very powerful “Lady,” giving promise that something special was going to occur.
It did. DeYoung stuck mainly to the hits, and they came out of the chute one-by-one, each sounding better than the other. Even “Mr. Roboto,” certainly one of the group’s more bombastic songs (and one of the main reasons why anyone of a certain age who likes Styx might not want to admit it) sounded excellent.
DeYoung told the story of the hit “Babe,” which was written for his wife and was only recorded after one of its co-authors (one of the Panozzo brothers, former bandmates) said, “hey, this doesn’t stink as bad as we thought it did.” His wife of 47 years, Suzanne, was one of his backup singers.
Of course, “Babe” went onto become one of Styx’s most endearing hits.
And, as the DJs back in the day used to say, “the hits just kept on coming.” The Best of Times,” “Too Much Time On My Hands,” “Desert Moon (from his solo album),” and “Fooling Yourself (another Styx production number that could have been inspired by ELP’s “Brain Salad Surgery),” just to name a few.
He closed the show with “Renegade,”‘ and then had the audience up, singing and dancing in the aisles with a stupendous version of “Come Sail Away,”
DeYoung was aided greatly by his band, August Zadra and Jimmy Leahy, who traded both riffs and backing vocals sounding almost exactly like James Young and Tommy Shaw from the original band; John Blasucci on keyboards, Craig Carter on bass and Michael Morales on drums.
It was obvious Money was going to have a tough act to follow. He persevered gamely, opening with “Baby Hold On,” and continuing with good versions of “No Control,” and “Another Soldier Coming Home,” which he dedicated to a soldier in the audience who had just come home from Afghanistan.
He did a very good cover of Smokey Robinson and the Miracles’ “You Really Got a Hold On Me,” which he said Smokey liked better than the Beatles’ version.
He finished up with his two most popular hits, “Two Tickets to Paradise,” and “Shakin.”
Money has always played non-challenging, straight-ahead rock ‘n’ roll, while Styx was always much more into production and theatrics. On this night, the production and theatrics worked, and DeYoung blew the roof of the place. Money, while he was good enough, just kind of paled by comparison.
